You, Too, Can Play Final Fantasy on MSX!

Setup Guide by solidification

solidification is a prolific creator of fan-made achievements across different game genres and especially in the world of Final Fantasy mods. You can follow solidification’s set-making journey here.

I got a few messages on how to get this stupid thing to work, so I’m going to put full instructions for RetroArch using blueMSX core. I cannot speak on any other emulator/core at all. See the bottom of this section for a pre-formatted User Disk (Disk 2) that you need for saving.

Getting This Stupid Crap to Work

1) Go here and get the blueMSXv282full.zip: http://bluemsx.msxblue.com/download.html

2) In that zip, put Machines and Databases into RetroArch’s systems folder (you can figure out where your directories are in RetroArch by opening it and going to Settings -> Directory)

3) Within RetroArch, download the blueMSX core

4) Get the FF1 rom from wherever. You need 2 disks: Game Disk (disk 1) and User Disk (disk 2). Disk 1 is the rom itself. Disk 2 is the user disk for saving. I have submitted a blank User Disk for RAPatches because some people struggle just to create and format the stupid thing, so it will hopefully be available when you download the translation patch.

4*) OPTIONAL: If you want to translate it, get the translation from RHDN. It comes with a .bps file. Get FLIPS (also at RHDN) and use FLIPS to patch the *game* disk with the .bps file to output a new, translated game disk. You only need to translate the game disk, not the user disk. As above, I have submitted a user disk pre-formatted and ready to use pending approval (I’ll delete this if approved).

5) Put these two in the same folder/directory somewhere you put your RetroArch games in and then, in that same folder/directory, create a text file. Copy and paste the titles of the two Disk files into it with Game Disk first and User Disk second. Rename your text file to something and change its extension from .txt to .m3u.

Example: I renamed my game disk to Final Fantasy (Disk 1).dsk and my user disk to Final Fantasy (Disk 2).dsk. Then my text file literally says:

Final Fantasy (Disk 1).dsk
Final Fantasy (Disk 2).dsk

and nothing else. I then renamed my textfile to Final Fantasy.m3u

6) Open RetroArch and choose the blueMSX core then open the Final Fantasy.m3u (or whatever you named it) file (not the game/user .dsk files)

7) Hold Left CTRL while booting. If you don’t, you’ll have to do a hard reset. You’ll know it was fine when it says “Say DOS… Okay!” and the game itself actually boots with the prolog story

8) If you have the User Disk I submitted, you’re good to go. If not, good luck trying to get this stupid emulator to read in your input. See the posts above on how to format a user disk.

Saving This Stupid Game

1) Go to an Inn. Choose to sleep, and it’ll yell at you to Insert User Disk.

2) Open the Quick Menu (F1) and go to Disc Control and choose to Eject Disk

3) Back in Disc Control, choose Current Disc Index and select 2

4) Back in Disc Control, choose Insert Disc

5) Go back into game (F1). It’ll save. It’ll ask you to Insert Game Disk.

6) Repeat Steps 2-4, but select 1 for Disc Index. Go back into game and resume playing.

Yes, you have to do this every single time you want to save. Enjoy!

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